How Trump could give the Pentagon a McMaster problem

HOW TRUMP COULD GIVE THE PENTAGON A MCMASTER PROBLEM, via our colleagues Wesley Morgan and Bryan Bender: “The growing expectation that President Donald Trump is going to force out Lt. Gen. H.R. McMaster as national security adviser raises a quandary: would the Army take him back?

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“Like his precarious position in the White House over the past year, McMaster’s stormy relationship with the Army leadership is nearly legendary due to his questioning of orthodoxy and brusque manner.

“Now, the Pentagon is grappling with what to do with the military’s leading warrior-intellectual should he become the latest Trump aide to be replaced, according to multiple current and former officers and administration officials — a predicament that even McMaster himself hinted at on Friday, when he told a reporter that ‘everybody has got to leave the White House at some point.’”

In the meantime, McMaster’s getting the Rex Tillerson treatment from Trump as he’s kept in a state of limbo, write POLITICO’s Eliana Johnson and Matthew Nussbaum.

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MD TRIVIA: Mark Kustra was the first to correctly identify the “Willie Victor,” the nickname of the aircraft flown by the Navy squadron VW-1 in Vietnam.

Check back Friday for this week’s question.

FOR YOUR RADAR — HASC AIMS FOR AN EARLY MAY NDAA MARKUP, our colleague Connor O’Brien reports: “The House Armed Services Committee plans to mark up its version of the fiscal 2019 National Defense Authorization Act on May 9, according to several aides familiar with the tentative schedule.

“Subcommittees will mark up their sections of the defense policy bill during the last week of April, with a recess week between subcommittee and full committee meetings.

“A specific date for floor debate hasn’t been announced, but aides said the aim is to act on the NDAA before Memorial Day. The full House typically debates the measure for two or three days, considering hundreds of amendments.”

ON THE HILL THIS WEEK — ANOTHER SHUTDOWN SHOWDOWN? House Republican leaders are expected to detail the $1.3 trillion fiscal 2018 omnibus spending bill in a closed-door meeting at 5:45 p.m. today, before government funding is set to expire Friday.

The full text of the bill is expected to be released afterwards, according to our colleagues at the Budget & Appropriations Brief.

The budget deal forged last month paved the way for $700 billion in national defense spending this year and $716 billion in fiscal 2019. The Pentagon is seeking spending flexibility amid concerns about its ability to spend the windfall this year — and whether it can do so responsibly.

— SENATE YEMEN DEBATE ON DECK: The Senate is expected to debate this week a joint resolution aimed at ending U.S. assistance to Saudi Arabia in the war in Yemen. The resolution is opposed by the Pentagon and Senate Republican leaders, who aim to put off a final vote while the Senate Foreign Relations Committee further examines the issue, CNN reports.

The debate comes as Saudi Arabia’s crown prince, Mohammed bin Salman, is scheduled to visit Washington, D.C. this week for talks with Trump.

And Trump wants to get the U.S. out of Syria’s war, so he asked the Saudi king for $4 billion, reports The Washington Post.

ON TUESDAY — THE SERVICE SECRETARIES TALK ACQUISITION REFORM WITH HASC: The military service secretaries are set to testify before the House Armed Services Committee on progress implementing acquisition reform as well as on the their fiscal 2019 budget requests.

ON WEDNESDAY — SASC PANEL EYES MISSILE DEFENSE WITH ROOD AND ROBINSON: The Senate Armed Services Strategic Forces Subcommittee hears from Undersecretary of Defense for Policy John Rood, as well as leaders of the North American Aerospace Defense Command, Missile Defense Agency and Army Space and Missile Defense Command, on ballistic missile defense.

The hearing comes as the Pentagon is expected to imminently complete its Ballistic Missile Defense Review.

And Energy Secretary Rick Perry appears before SASC to discuss the challenges faced by the Energy Department’s atomic energy programs.

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CORKER: TRUMP LIKELY TO QUIT IRAN DEAL, via POLITICO’s Louis Nelson: “Senate Foreign Relations Committee Chairman Bob Corker said Sunday that he believes President Donald Trump is likely to pull the U.S. out of the Iran nuclear deal in May, a step that would undo one of the major foreign policy achievements claimed by former President Barack Obama.

“Corker (R-Tenn.) told CBS’s ‘Face the Nation’ that such a move by Trump could be avoided if the president’s concerns, which deal largely with Iran’s actions outside the specifics of the nuclear deal, are addressed as part of a multilateral framework. Such an agreement seems unlikely, Corker said.”

And Iran says any new European sanctions would affect the nuclear deal, via Reuters.

MCMASTER MEETS WITH ALLIED ADVISERS ON NORTH KOREA, reports Yonhap News Agency: “Chung Eui-yong, top security adviser to South Korean President Moon Jae-in, traveled to the United States over the weekend to hold talks with his U.S. and Japanese counterparts on the upcoming dialogue with North Korea, Seoul's presidential office Cheong Wa Dae said Monday.

WAR REPORT — SYRIAN REBELS, BACKED BY TURKEY, SEIZE AFRIN, reports The New York Times: “Turkish-backed Syrian rebels seized control on Sunday morning of the city of Afrin, the target of a two-month military operation against Kurdish militias in the enclave in Syria. The takeover dealt a blow to Kurdish aspirations for self-administration there and added to Turkey’s growing footprint in the country.

The Syrian rebel forces, which have served as advance troops for the Turkish operation, seemed to have entered the city without a fight, after the Kurdish People’s Protection Units, or Y.P.G., withdrew to the surrounding hills. But residents described chaos as fleeing civilians were trapped by artillery and by Turkish airstrikes.

The seizure of Afrin, a mainly Kurdish city near the Turkish border, came as other Syrian rebel groups appeared close to collapse in the besieged enclave of eastern Ghouta, in the suburbs of Damascus. Syrian forces have split the enclave into three parts under a blistering barrage of artillery and airstrikes.

Meanwhile, Eastern Ghouta rebels are negotiating a cease-fire with the U.N., Reuters reports.

And an Air Force general downplays possible restrictions at Turkey’s Incirlik Air Base, via Military.com.

PUTIN CLAIMS VICTORY IN RUSSIA’S PRESIDENTIAL ELECTION, POLITICO’s Marc Bennetts reports: “Vladimir Putin secured a fourth presidential term on Sunday in a landslide election victory, according to state preliminary results, amid reports of widespread pressure on voters and a crackdown on the opposition.

“Putin won 76.6 percent of the vote, while his nearest rival, Communist Party candidate Pavel Grudinin, took 11.8 percent, with 99.8 percent of the votes counted, according to the government-controlled election committee.

"'We will think of the future of our great motherland, of the future of our children,' Putin told a victory rally near Red Square, before leading a flag-waving crowd in a sustained chant of 'Russia! Russia!'

"The absolute certainty of Putin’s election victory means that apathy, rather than one of his seven nominal rival candidates, had been the president’s biggest concern."

— Elon Musk’s new spaceship could kick off the next Space Age: The Daily Beast

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About The Author

Greg Hellman is a defense reporter for POLITICO Pro. He is the author of the Morning Defense newsletter and covers Congress.

Prior to joining POLITICO, Greg worked as a national security analyst for the Government Accountability Office where he focused on defense and counter-ISIS policy. He also worked as a reporter for Bloomberg BNA and Inside Washington Publishers, where he covered worker-safety policy.

Greg grew up outside Milwaukee, Wis. He graduated from Boston University in 2008 and American University in 2013.